


A Bowl and Remote Control

by trespresh



Series: I'm Half-Doomed, You're Semi-Sweet [12]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Cereal, Headcanon, Len Loves Barry, M/M, Overgrown Man-Children, Sleepy Cuddles, cartoons, fluffy nonsense, pure fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-15
Updated: 2016-01-15
Packaged: 2018-05-14 01:58:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5725486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trespresh/pseuds/trespresh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Len doesn’t bother to smother the fond grin this time. He pours himself a bowl of the Cheerios and joins Barry on the couch, folding his legs underneath himself in a mirror of Barry’s position.</p><p>“What’re we watching?” he asks, taking a bite of his cereal.</p><p>(In which they eat cereal and watch cartoons like the overgrown man-children they are.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Bowl and Remote Control

**Author's Note:**

> Early morning sleepy Coldflash is my favorite Coldflash, so this happened. All my thanks and love to [this one](http://that-pumpkinspicewhitegirl.tumblr.com/). ♥
> 
> Characters belong to DCU. Title belongs to the man, Kendrick Lamar.

Len wakes up alone.

He can tell the other side of the bed is empty before he even opens his eyes. There’s something about the dip of the bed underneath him, the way the blankets feel somehow colder with just his own body heat to warm them. He stretches an arm out to Barry’s side and cracks an eye open when he doesn’t feel Barry’s warm, smooth skin under his fingers.

He buries his face in his pillow and sighs. There’s nothing in this world—no heist he could pull off, no priceless artwork he could steal—that feels as good, as relieving and grounding and triumphant, as waking up next to Barry. Barry is the warmth in his blankets; he’s the tiny, breathy snore that interrupts the dead silence of Len’s bedroom and the comfortable scratch of stubble against Len’s shoulder when Barry burrows against him.

Len hates waking up alone.

He rolls onto his back, reaching blindly over the edge of the bed until his fingers find his phone. He blinks blearily at the screen, expecting perhaps a text of explanation from Barry, but there’s nothing. He figures Barry left to patrol the city, or maybe his team called with an emergency—a little old lady needing help crossing the road, maybe, or a kitten stuck in a tree. Len certainly hopes it was something ridiculous and superfluous like that, because he’s honest-to-god willing to ice anyone committing a crime big enough to pull Barry out of Len’s bed at 7:30 on a Saturday morning.

He sits up and twists around to set his feet on the cold wooden floor, hunching over to drop his head into his hands and rub at his eyes before standing. He pads across the floor, across the hallway into the bathroom, and it’s on his way back to bed that he hears it.

Quiet but over-exaggerated voices come from the living room down the hallway. Len is instantly and tensely alert, his head whipping in the direction of the noise and his eyes narrowed. The voices are tinny, the sounds hushed except for the occasional punctuating scream, followed by theatrically suspenseful music—

The television is on.

Len heads back into the bedroom to pull on sweatpants and a t-shirt before creeping down the hallway toward the living room. The sounds of the television get louder the closer he gets, and when he turns the corner—

“Barry?”

Barry is sitting cross-legged on the couch. His Star Trek t-shirt is rumpled and his hair is messy and soft-looking, stubble littering his chin and cheeks. There’s a blanket tossed around his shoulders, pooling around his legs, and in his lap is a bowl of brightly-colored cereal. His eyes are tired and half-hooded, but he looks up at Len with an easy, albeit sheepish, grin.

He looks unbearably adorable.

“Hey, g’morning. Did I wake you? I tried to keep the volume low.”

Len scrubs a hand over his head and yawns. “What’re you doing up so early?”

Barry chews thoughtfully on his cereal, pointing his spoon at the television and mumbling something around his mouthful that sounds suspiciously like, “Cartoons.”

Len snorts in an attempt to hide his smile, thoroughly endeared.

“I’ll turn it down. I didn’t mean to wake you,” Barry says, earnest, and Len waves a hand.

“It’s okay, you didn’t.”

He trudges into the kitchen and stops at the counter. Sitting there next to Barry’s box of Froot Loops is a box of Honey Nut Cheerios. Len’s favorite.

“You were running low,” comes Barry’s voice from the living room, mingling with the shouts from the television, “so I bought you a new box when I went out to get my Froot Loops this morning.”

Len doesn’t bother to smother the fond grin this time. He pours himself a bowl of the Cheerios and joins Barry on the couch, folding his legs underneath himself in a mirror of Barry’s position.

“What’re we watching?” he asks, taking a bite of his cereal.

Barry smiles over at Len, his eyes crinkling at the corners. He scoots an inch closer to Len so their knees are touching, tossing the blanket over Len’s shoulders as well.

“X-Men: Evolution,” he says, looking back toward the screen.

Len doesn’t _mean_ to keep looking at Barry, honestly, and he doesn’t look away until Barry glances knowingly over at him again. Len takes another bite.

“You’re a superhero, watching a show about superheroes?” Len asks, quiet and teasing. “Is this some subconscious, narcissistic thing I should know about?”

“Shut up,” Barry chuckles, nudging Len with his knee. “This show is awesome.”

Barry falls asleep against Len’s shoulder before the episode ends. Len sets both of their empty bowls on the coffee table before leaning back against the arm of the couch, pulling Barry with him easily. It’s with Barry half on top of him, a warm and welcome weight against his chest, that Len falls asleep.

(And if waking up with Barry is the best thing in the world, falling asleep with him is a close second.)


End file.
